//------------------------------// // A Brilliant Idea // Story: The Married Life // by Legacy55 //------------------------------// “Come on, Celestia. I think you’ve had enough now!” Luna mumbled in frustration, slamming her hoof against the stone floor. “Oh Sister, you have no idea HOW good these are…” Celestia said with a mouthful of pancakes, syrup running down her mouth and chin like a waterfall. She continued to shovel them down with no apparent sign of stopping. “But you’ve already had a dozen!” “Please, Luna, just one more…” After finishing what was left on her plate, she looked towards the chef patiently. He was in quite a sour mood; the fact that Celestia woke him up to make pancakes probably attributed to it. “Fine! One more, but then off to bed!” After what seemed like forever to Celestia, the chef turned around and threw another pancake on her plate. The poor thing barely had a chance, as half of it was already in the alicorn’s mouth within the blink of an eye. She moaned as she ate the rest of it, enjoying every last bite of the sweet, delectable food. Luna cringed upon the sight of her sister’s monstrous eating manners. She had never seen Celestia act so ill mannered, so it shocked her to watch her sister shovel down pancakes like an angry bear. Seeing her eat the last of her food, she spoke up. “Alright, now off to bed!” Celestia looked up from her plate and frowned at her. “Are you kidding me?! The night is still young! In fact, I don’t think I’ll go to sleep at all!” She giggled, jumping up from her seat and rushing out of the kitchen. “Wait! Celestia!” She tried running after her, but quickly realized she had already disappeared from sight. The sugar from the syrup must have given her some kind of energy rush, as she had never seen her move so fast before. She growled and gritted her teeth. “Go get the guard; tell them Celestia isn’t feeling well and that she’s running around the castle!” She pointed a hoof at the chef, who stared back with an angry look. “Me?! You wake me up in the middle of the night to make pancakes, and now you expect me to run about as your messenger?!” He barked back at Luna, shocking her. “I quit!” He yelled in frustration, throwing his hat to the ground. “Well, fine! I’ll just go get the guards myself! Hopefully Celestia hasn’t gotten into any trouble yet…” ------------------- “Where are we going, Pinkie?” Discord questioned, almost running out of breath as he followed the pink pony. “Almost there! Just a little further!” He glanced around at the scenery, finding they were now out of Ponyville at this point. In the distance, he could make out a mass of clouds, and he quickly realized where they were heading. “Isn’t Rainbow Dash sleeping right now? It is a little late…” “Oh, I’m sure she won’t mind! Anyway, this is important! You said yourself, you don’t have that much time left!” “Well, I suppose you’re right…” Within a few seconds they arrived at the floating house. Discord snapped his fingers and they both appeared at her doorstop. Pinkie rapped loudly at the door and yelled. “Rainbow Dash! Wake up! We need you!” There were a few seconds of silence before she shouted back. “Go away, Pinkie! I’m trying to sleep here!” “But come on, Dashie! Discord’s here and he needs your help!” There was some loud shuffling before the door was thrown open, revealing a tired looking pegasus. “What do you want?!” She asked, looking rather annoyed. Her eyes were full of sleep, and she was struggling to stand up because she was so drowsy. As soon as he saw her, a light bulb went off in Discord’s head. “That’s it! You’re a genius, Pinkie Pie!” He shouted, picking her up. “I am?” She craned her head at him. “Yes!” He put her down and grinned at the pegasus. “There’s no pony cooler then Rainbow Dash! You could teach me how to act like the young ponies these days, and I’ll feel a thousand years younger!” “That’s a great idea!” Pinkie smiled. “I was just going to ask her to go do some pranks with us!” Rainbow Dash looked at them with a scowl. “You woke me up for this? To think I thought it was actually important…” She turned around and started towards her bedroom. “Wait!” Discord yelled, causing her to turn around with a sigh. “Whatever you want, I can get it! All I ask is for you to teach me to be like you!” She stared at him for a few minutes, thinking about what she wanted most in the world. “Alright, I want to hang out with the Wonderbolts for a day! If you can do that, I’ll teach you!” “Done! I’ll tell Celestia right away! Now, where do we start?” “How about tomorrow? ‘Cause right now, I’d like to go to bed…” She mumbled. “Gotcha!” Discord nodded back. Rainbow Dash slammed the door leaving the two of them alone outside. “Thanks, Pinkie Pie! This is absolutely brilliant! There’s no way it could fail!” “No problem! But… now what?” Discord put a claw under his chin and stood silent for a minute. “Well, Celestia’s probably worried about me like always. I really should be getting back to the castle.” “Well, then bye Discord! See ya tomorrow!” Pinkie Pie shouted, jumping off of the cloud. Well, I hope Celestia isn’t too worried…. Whenever I’m out of her sight for more than a few hours, she starts thinking that I’m causing trouble… -------------------------- “Catch me, Luna! Catch me!” Celestia yelled between a fit of giggles as she turned another corner of the hedge maze. The loud hooves behind her indicated that her sister was in hot pursuit. “Come now, sister! This is ridiculous!” Luna heaved, barely able to keep up with her drugged sister. “Why don’t you just stop this stupid game and go to bed!?” “I don’t wanna!” She called back from somewhere within the maze. Luna stopped and took a deep breath. For a pregnant mare, her sister really could run. Suddenly, an idea popped into her head that made her feel incredibly stupid. She had wings! The princess of the night took off into the air and scanned the hedge maze for the white alicorn. Within a few moments, she caught sight of her and swooped down after her. Celestia was happily skipping along the path, no longer afraid that her sister would catch her. She jumped back in fright when Luna suddenly landed in front of her. “Gotcha!” Luna yelled in exhaustion, reaching a hoof out and touching her sister. A frown appeared on her face, “Aww… Now I’m it!” Celestia quickly poked her sister back and grinned. “You’re it!” She turned another corner and disappeared once again into the maze. Luna stomped her hoof against the soft earth and growled. Had anypony been near, they would have noticed the twitch in her left eye. She had been chasing her sister around for over an hour now, which was a truly fruitless and exhausting task. “Fine, Celestia! You win! You can freeze your flank off out here, but I’m going inside!” She shouted into the night before teleporting into the castle. Luna paced down the hallway to her bedroom, and just as she went to open her door, a flash filled the room and Discord appeared. “There you are, Luna! Where’s Celestia? She isn’t in bed!” “You’re wife is in the hedge maze…” She growled back. “Go chase her yourself, because I’ve had enough of her stupid game!” Luna slammed her door shut, leaving Discord to wonder why she was so upset. “But Celestia running around in the hedge maze? I’ve got to see this!” --------------------- From high in the air, Discord scanned the hedge maze, catching no sign of his drugged wife. “Celestia?!” He called out into the cool night. “Celestia?!” Hearing no response he sighed. “Now, where could she be? I just have to think like her! If I was a pregnant mare who swallowed a whole bottle of morphine, where would I be?” A sudden, high-pitched laugh pierced his thoughts, and he quickly recognized it to be Celestia. Determining the source to be coming from the library, he teleported into the warm castle. The Grand Library of Canterlot Castle truly was grand, with bookshelves as far as the eye could see. It was the largest collection of books in Equestria, and one could spend an eternity reading what was held in its stacks. Discord was sure Twilight had spent her fair amount of time in this place. “Celestia?” He yelled, glancing around the massive, ornate room. Another laugh echoed around him, and he followed the noise down one of the shelves. Coming to the end of it, he gasped at what he saw. An enormous castle made of books loomed over him, and sitting on the top, frantically building it larger, was his wife. “Celestia?! What in the name of Equestria are you doing?!” She paused a moment from her construction to gaze down at her husband. “Discord! Quick, get inside! Before the book demon gets you!” “Book demon? Come now, Celestia! You’re not feeling well. Just get down from your little castle and let’s go to bed…” “No! This book fort is the only thing that can protect me from the book demon!” Celestia used her magic to levitate over another pile of books, which she quickly began adding onto her fort. Sighing, Discord teleported up beside her. From the top of her ‘Book Fort’ he could see the entire library and its seemingly endless shelves. She certainly had a lot of building materials; she could keep building forever if she wanted. “And… there!” Celestia placed a final book and sighed. “The mighty book fortress is done! Now we’ll be safe!” She squealed, turning her attention to the rest of the library. “Now, where is that evil, shriveled demon…?” Discord was speechless; he had never seen somepony act so crazy since Twilight had her second mental breakdown. “Celestia, you’re acting crazy! And that’s coming from me!” “Crazy?” She looked at him and let out a high pitched cackle. “Ha! You won’t call me crazy when you see the demon… THERE IT IS!” She suddenly yelled, pointing a hoof towards a nearby shelf. Discord looked over and saw an elderly mare, who seemed rather upset that the books were being used to build a fort. “I think that’s the librarian…” “No! It’s evil incarnate, I tell you! Now quickly, attack!” She started pelting the poor mare with books, who in turn glared at her with a cross look. “Quick, Discord, more books! We need to banish this monster to the fires from whence it came!” “Celestia, I’m all for some chaos and all, but you’re going to hurt somepony if you keep this up!” “AH! I’m out of books!” She roared at the top of her lungs. “I’ll have to start taking from the fo…” Before Celestia could throw more books at the old librarian, she collapsed against the ceiling of her fort. Snores filled the air as she drifted off into a deep sleep. “I guess she finally crashed… Well…” He glanced around at the huge mess his wife had made, and then at the angry librarian who was shouting curse words up at them. “I’m sure somepony will clean this up…” He snapped his fingers and both he and Celestia vanished. ----------------------------- “Oh, my head… What happened last night?” Celestia mumbled to herself as the painful rays of the sun blinded her. “Wait, I don’t remember raising the sun!” She shot out of her bed and looked around her room in confusion. Just then, the door to her bedroom was thrown open, and Luna walked in with an annoyed expression. “Well, look who’s finally up!” “Luna? Would you mind filling me in on what’s going on?! I can barely remember last night, and I’m positive I didn’t raise the sun this morning!” “You didn’t. I had to! As If raising the moon isn’t exhausting enough…” “Oh, well… thank you sister.” Celestia nodded back before lying back down on her soft, warm bed. “…And about last night… you don’t remember a thing?” “Well, I do remember being in the library… and something to do with pancakes… but that’s all!” Luna growled and looked at her sister with frustration. “Well, you ingested a whole bottle of morphine and then went on to cause chaos all over the castle. The servants are still cleaning up your mess in the library, and now we need to find a new cook and a librarian!” “Oh…” Celestia mumbled, hardly able to believe she did any of those things. “What about Discord? Where’s he?” “Discord? He said something about going to Ponyville… Now let’s go, you have some apologizing to do…”